Dubai: Gilded Cage
by Syed Ali
Yale University Press, 240 pp., $20.00 (paper)
Dubai: The Vulnerability of Success
by Christopher M. Davidson
Columbia University Press, 376 pp., $32.50; $19.50 (paper)
City of Gold: Dubai and the Dream of Capitalism
by Jim Krane
St. Martin’s, 356 pp., $27.99
In mid-May, with Dubai reeling from the effects of the global financial crisis, I flew into town and took a taxi down the Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai’s main thoroughfare, which runs parallel to the Persian Gulf. The evening rush hour had not ended, but the road was clear of traffic; during previous visits to Dubai I’d encountered gridlock day and night all along this highway. As we approached downtown Dubai, we ran a long gauntlet of illuminated skyscrapers, all built during the past few years. Covered with garish architectural flourishes, many were unfinished, with exposed steel girders and cranes frozen above them; almost all displayed TO LET signs in their windows.
